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Watch: Phone calls with Trump like 'sausages', says Macron

Watch: Phone calls with Trump like 'sausages', says Macron

President Macron takes a jibe at Trump

Story highlights

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu echoed the need for confidentiality

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday his phone calls with USPresident Donald Trump and other world leaders were just likesausages: better not explain what's inside.

During a news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Macron was asked about a CNN report on Monday saying that a phone call between the French leader and Trump last week had been "terrible."

Borrowing a famous quote from 19th-century Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck, Macron summed up his policy of refraining from making off-the-record comments about his conversations with other world leaders.

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu echoed the need for confidentiality.

A readout from the French presidency of Macron's call with Trump last week said the 40-year old president had told Trump that his decision to slap tariffs on the exports of USallies were both "illegal" and a "mistake."

The shorter White House readout of the same call said the conversation had focused on trade and immigration, without elaborating.

Macron, appalled by his predecessor Francois Hollande's frequent off-the-record comments to journalists, has kept the press at a distance since his election last year and banned his aides from giving behind-the-scenes accounts of his presidency.

He said on Tuesday that he would have a "useful" and "frank" exchange with Trump at the next G7 summit in Canada on June 7-8 about both issues on which they agree and those where they disagree.